EMU Chief Says She’ll Get Counseling After Alcohol-Related Outburst

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YPSILANTI (WWJ/AP) - The president of Eastern Michigan University says she’ll follow her board’s suggestion and get counseling after receiving a threat of firing following an alcohol-related outburst.

Susan Martin released a statement Tuesday acknowledging that she was reprimanded after she lost her temper and “made inappropriate remarks” to an alumnus at a university reception in Washington. She says the April 23 incident involved a disagreement about an event in the university’s past. Martin says she’d been drinking that day on an empty stomach.

The school’s Board of Regents warned Martin that she could be fired if she is involved in any future public incidents related to alcohol use, citing “other incidents” preceding the argument apparently involving the overconsumption of alcohol.

Martin said Wednesday that she plans to take the board’s suggestion and get counseling.

Martin said she also plans to donate her raise this year to a campus alcohol education fund. Tax records show she made $295,000 last year, and she’s scheduled for an $8,764 raise.

Martin has acknowledged a 2005 impaired driving case that regents were aware of before she was hired in July 2008.

Despite agreeing to counseling, Martin maintains that she does not have a drinking problem and that another alcohol-related squabble will not occur during her time as president.